Portraits of You
by Rory J. Evans
Summary: Peter/Caspian. Whenever Caspian can't sleep and even when he can , he thinks about Peter. It's a comfort to him now, though, he's only alive in his dreams.


I don't own the book nor the movie. There are some spoilers here for both, though.

Portraits of You

Caspian was awake - he knew it, though his eyes blinked in and out of consciousness. There was something cold dripping down the side of his face and a sharp ache in his side that was lessening and lessening with each shuddered breath.

He tried to recapture the last few moments of sleep, tendrils and coils of thoughts that led straight to his dreams. From what he could remember, it was a nice dream - airy, light, full of life, yet transluscent, lacking the distinct opaqueness that would make it truly real.

His gaze shifted to his curtains streaming ominous strands of moonlight onto the floor as his eyes drooped down, heavier than usual, but at least they obscured the eerie shadows and cast him further into his reveries.

He could just remember it, the faces not fully there, but the eyes, oh the eyes, the dyed silver-blue that shone and sparkled, vibrant still, after years of wear and use. He remembered those eyes, the same from the too-crude drawings in the story books; features that he had to fill in, cheekbones that he needed to sharpen, noses that needed distinct shapes, all combined to form the lean, hard figure of Peter in hunting regalia astride a horse.

He liked that picture best; the likenesses's face he would trace with reverent fingertips until he was sure there were slight grooves from the pattern of his fingers. He'd like to think he left an imprint on Peter, at least on the one in the picture.

There were others, though. In some, a body part was obscured - right arm by Queen Susan, left leg by horse - so he gathered them all together and made the image complete, his very own composite of all the Peters on the page.

He knew his expressions, the variety of them as captured by the artist, but the rest of them he had to imagine in his mind.

Sometimes he felt like he had spent a lifetime with Peter, had truly known him. He had read of his reign, found every book he could on the subject and kept them safe in the closet in his room, the passageway through the false door effectively blocked by the sheer number of leather-bound tomes.

Sometimes he would sit with them splayed out on his bed or the floor, reading snippets of a letter, half-missing, as if it were addressed to him and not a Duke from Archenland. He would finish it himself, plan out what he thought Peter would say and often times, the last words always ended in sincere endearments and amorous proclamations.

A thousand imaginings would go through his head, situations that he and Peter might find themselves in, times when he could coax out that wonderful smile that he knew the King would have but the world probably only rarely saw, or what he would have to do to make Peter angry which always inevitably ended with doing something to make it all better. He imagined soft kisses and hard bodies, the raw strength of the legend pressing into him, on top of him, and (if he dared think about it) beneath him.

He wanted all those things that couldn't be said and couldn't be felt in his dreams. He wanted Peter to teach him how to be a good king, wanted to be shown his mistakes, wanted his failures to be pointed out because seemingly anything with Peter was always somehow better than even the best without.

Vaguely, a jet of moonlight shot itself across his eyes, but his arm felt heavy and he was too tired to lift it. Thoughts of the unusual weight briefly flit across his mind, but he pushed his physical discomfort away in favor of more pleasing thoughts.

For a moment, he did think about how the King, though never present, always effortlessly made himself at home in his thoughts, how he shoved out even the more important matters of the time. It was troubling, how much of an influence he actually was.

He could almost picture the expression on Peter's face if he saw him now; a gentle worry would probably grace his brow over Caspian's sleeplessness and frets, and he would let Caspian curl around him, knowing that that was the only way his insomnia would be cured. For now, he was content to imagine as the real thing was so far away that neither Narnian history nor Caspian could touch him.

To his right, something whirled by his ear, the sound of it somehow reminiscent of what he thought Queen Susan's arrows would sound like, not deafened by the low thrum of battle.

Queen Susan - she was there too in the pictures, standing proudly next to Peter. Caspian viewed her dark beauty with a cursory glance, too much like his own to make him appreciate its subtlety, and completely lacking in comparison to the golden radiance of her brother.

On some days, rainy days when there was nothing to do but ponder, he thought about how much better it would be if he could force himself to think about Queen Susan the way he does Peter.

Then, hours would not be spent contemplating the moral implications of something that was never meant to happen. Then, his dreams would be filled with visions of soft curves and delicate wrists, not lithe boys with too much skin and too bright eyes. Then, he would finally stop being tortured by the appearance of every crown of blond hair; every voice that seemed deepened and wise from years of rule but still harbored an edge of boy, careless in its inflections; every calloused hand that clasped his arm in greeting and gave him the hollow hope that if he looked up, he would meet the eyes of Peter.

He knew they all had to stop, that he was living in a dream, but Caspian couldn't imagine a foreseeable end to those types of thoughts if only because they filled his days with some sense of magic and beauty. Peter was as much a part of him now as he was of the lands of Narnia and the strong Northern Wind - the last vestige of hope to everyone that heard of his adventures, whispered in hushed reverent tones to children at nighttime or warriors before battle.

But Caspian felt that at least some small part of Peter was his (and consequently, that some of him belonged to Peter). Over the years, he had discovered that they shared a certain connection: monarchs, both beginning their rule at roughly the same age, fatherless, both seeking to escape a war, headstrong, impulsive, both striving for something - they didn't know what - beyond their grasp, both thrust into a situation and made to act.

He had felt closer to Peter than anyone else in his life, though all he knew of him was only what he hungrily garnered from books and stories.

Caspian had always believed in King Peter, the boy-king who still flashed before his eyes, unchanged by time and as Magnificent (at least to Caspian) as he ever was.

Not even the loud splinter of wood close to his ear could tear him away or break him out of musings. He was thinking about what Peter might have done after he disappeared, whether he was safe, if he realized that Narnia still existed (but just barely) without him.

He wouldn't have time to reflect on the irony, but in that moment, he noticed the severed end of an arrow jutting from his side as the pain became too much to ignore. Somewhere from his chest erupted a sharp throb, cold and broken and jagged. His legs and arms lay heavily where they were thrown in his sleep. Beside him, among the torn scraps of curtains, were scattered arrows, some just breaking the skin where they hit and others that missed him all together but rolled to rest alongside his body.

Through half-lidded eyes and all ready blurring vision, he thought he could make out the vague figures of men and the bulky outline of armour. Caspian coughed and something wet came from his throat to flow across his lips and drip onto his chin. Someone turned to the sound, tapped a few of the others on the shoulders, and they looked at him and nodded. It wouldn't be long now.

Before Caspian could give a cry for help (from them or anyone else, he wasn't sure), they were gone and the door closed quietly behind them.

His world was cast into deafness - maybe just silence - but it was unsettling. Caspian's head lolled to the side and he thought he imagined Peter before him, deft fingers flicking the hair out of his eyes, and a smile that instantly made him warmer. He wanted to smile back, but he had been biting his lip without noticing and the expression turned to more of a grimace. He imagined that Peter's kind eyes softened as he leaned closer to place a kiss on his forehead and Caspian closed his own in contentment.

When he opened them, the presense of Peter was no longer there, replaced by his tutor emerging from his wardrobe and shoving the books - his books! - away from the doors. They fell on the floor in piles open to random pages, some landing near his feet. His tutor looked down as if not wanting to acknowledge that he had been too late or to witness Caspian on the bed, dying. He made his way over quickly and knelt by him, pushing the book that had opened to Caspian's favorite picture of Peter aside with his knee.

Caspian stared at it, the happy upturned face of the boy whom he had idolized and loved his entire life. Cornelius followed his gaze and clutched one of Caspian's slippery hands in his own.

Caspian willed his throat to move but the only sound it produced was a quiet "Why?" no more than an exhaled breath. He was still looking at the picture and Cornelius himself didn't know whether he wasn't speaking to Peter instead of to him. He could feel his own eyes well with tears. He had failed both Caspian and Narnia, and even the King Peter who was supposed to come to save them. All for nothing.

His hands shook. "I'm sorry, my Prince," he said a little breathlessly. "Your Aunt - she has given birth to a son."

But Caspian's eyes had all ready drifted shut, the last remnants of his broken thoughts before them of Peter.


End file.
